A man, Mr. Femi Oguntunwase, and his wife, Modupe,were found dead in their house in the new site area of Oba Ile town in the Akure North Local Government Area of Ondo State.
A source in the town said the cause of the death of the couple had yet to be known, adding that their lifeless bodies were found on the floor of the sitting room of their apartment on Saturday.
The source said the husband was on the ground naked, while the wife was also on the floor in a T-shirt and a wrapper with a bottle of palm oil beside them.
A resident of the area, who identified himself only as Seluwa, said the couple was seen in the morning of the day, adding that neighbours were surprised to find them dead in the afternoon.
She said, “We saw the husband in the morning, but in the afternoon, they were found dead.”
She explained that a bowl of pap and some akara balls were seen beside the deceased, which showed that they died after taking their breakfast.
It was gathered that when the neighbours entered into the apartment, palm oil was inside the deceased’s mouths, which indicated that they might have eaten poison and drunk palm oil to suppress it.
“There was palm oil in their mouths. It may be when they were having stomach pain that they drank the palm oil. We also discovered that the death happened after their breakfast.”
When contacted on the telephone on Wednesday, the Public Relations Officer of the state police command, Mr. Femi Joseph, confirmed the incident, saying the remains of the deceased had been deposited at the Ondo State Specialists Hospital, Akure, the state capital.
He said the command had not made any arrest on the incident because it had not been established that the couple were killed.
He said, “We got the report of the incident on Saturday and we are still investigating to get to the cause of the death. The bodies have been deposited at the hospital for autopsy; it is after the autopsy that we will know the next step to take.”